Landscape composition influences abundance patterns and habitat use of three ungulate species in fragmented secondary deciduous tropical forests, Mexico
Secondary forests are extensive in the tropics. Currently, these plant communities are the available habitats for wildlife and in the future they will possibly be some of the most wide-spread ecosystems world-wide. To understand the potential role of secondary forests for wildlife conservation, three ungulate species were studied: Mazama temama, Odocoileus virginianus and Pecari tajacu. We analyzed their relative abundance and habitat use at two spatial scales: (1) Local, where three different successional stages of tropical deciduous forest were compared, and (2) Landscape, where available habitats were compared in terms of landscape composition (proportion of forests, pastures and croplands within 113 ha). To determine the most important habitat-related environmental factors influencing the Sign Encounter Rate (SER) of the three ungulate species, 11 physical, anthropogenic and vegetation variables were simultaneously analyzed through model selection using Akaike's Information Criterion. We found, that P. tajacu and O. virginianus mainly used early successional stages, while M. temama used all successional stages in similar proportions. The latter species, however, used early vegetation stages only when they were located in landscapes mainly covered by forest (97%). P. tajacu and O. virginianus also selected landscapes covered essentially by forests, although they required smaller percentages of forest (86%). All ungulate species avoided landscape fragments covered by pastures. For all three species, landscape composition and human activities were the variables that best explained SER. We concluded that landscape is the fundamental scale for ungulate management, and that secondary forests are potentially important landscape elements for ungulate conservation.
Main Authors: | García Marmolejo, Gabriela Doctora autora 13439, Chapa Vargas, Leonardo autor, Weber, Manuel Doctor autor 2021, Huber Sannwald, Elisabeth autora 14351 |
---|---|
Format: | Texto biblioteca |
Language: | eng |
Subjects: | Ungulados, Mazama temama, Odocoileus virginianus, Tayassu tajacu, Hábitat (Ecología), Bosque secundario, Actividades antropogénicas, |
Online Access: | https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2351989415000359 |
Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
Similar Items
-
Potential distributional patterns of three wild ungulate species in a fragmented tropical region of northeastern Mexico
by: Vilchis Nestor, Claudia Andrea Doctora 12887, et al. -
Habitat preferences of ungulates in hunted and nonhunted areas in the Calakmul forest, Campeche, Mexico
by: Reyna Hurtado, Rafael Ángel Doctor autor/a 10474, et al. -
Potential distributional patterns of three wild ungulate species in a fragmented tropical region of northeastern Mexico
by: Claudia Vilchis, et al. -
Source-sink systems and conservation of hunted ungulates in the Lacandon Forest, Mexico
by: Naranjo Piñera, Eduardo Jorge 1963- Doctor autor/a 5447, et al. -
Densidad, abundancia relativa, distribución y uso local de los ungulados en la cuenca del Río Lacantún, Chiapas, México
by: Bolaños Citalán, Jorge Eduardo Licenciado autor/a 20959
Published: (2000)